Hootenanny Hoot

They had a Hoot-Nanny.

...and the film about their life is a hoot... HOOTNANNY HOOT in fact from 1963 and filmed TV style on the MGM back lot one Tuesday afternoon before the bulldozer tore through the Andy Hardy street. One other comment on this site correctly identifies the same storyline as ROCK AROUD THE CLOCK and the remake TWIST AROUND THE CLOCK and now this remake... (stray TV Producer wanders into isolated rural utopia and - gasp - discovers it to be chock full'o new performers and their dancin pals all set to be ruthlessly exploited as their 'new music style' sweeps the nation) ....now as a bumpkin drive in spectacular with a trolley full of plunkin pickin groups. All that is missing is Merle Haggard and Jayne Mansfield in a caftan (now available on DVD in LAS VEGAS HILLBILLES) ... HOOTNANNY must be well respected in Australia as we saw it at 8.30pm TCM time slot which for some misguided reason made it the most watched program of the night. Not that we couldn't have switched stations... why would you? HOOTNANNY HOOT is exactly that... trios of banjo fun with people who look dressed for church, matched by angular dance moves by young'uns who look like Barbie and Ken. Now if I can only see COUNTRY MUSIC JAMBOREE starring that Queen Of Outer Space: Zsa Zsa Gabor. I am soooo excited.

Honestly I'm not sure how to rate this movie. I was laughing so hard at times I had tears in my eyes.

Any movie that tries so hard to be hip, but has a banjo in every other song, is doomed to the ridiculous.

The Hootenany circus, the grand finale of the movie, is maybe the most bizarre staging of musical numbers I have ever seen in a movie. The Gateway Trio singing "Foolish Questions" while bouncing up and down on a trampoline is the epitome of square.

On the other hand, Judy Henske torches her two songs in the movie. Wow! There's several other really strong songs as well, and also a few that are snooze inducers. The choreography is a strange mix of early Rock n' Roll, Broadway, and Hee Haw. All rolled together, the dancing is kind of great.

The plot and acting are awful, the sets cheap as can be. But if you're in a silly mood and like folk music, it's quite a movie, and I'll recommend it to you.

This was a great movie! The guys wear suits/ties, and, when everyone was at the beach in their swimming suits, along comes this guy in full dress with his sweater on! The camera work was great too, lots of weird low-angle and high-angle face shots like Hitchcock would do. The music and "dancing" was really great. A real slice of the time we were in limbo, after too much Presley and before the Fab Four. Check this one out and yell a lot at it, it's fun! And don't take these other reviews too seriously, they just like reading what they wrote. That's All Folks

An attempt by Hollywood to cash in on the early folk music craze of the sixties, "Hootenanny's" cheap budget makes it look much like a television episode.

Let's talk about the good things of this movie first:

1. A young Johnny Cash does his version of "Frankie and Johnny". It's great to see The Man In Black looking so good.

2. Pamela Austin (who went on to become "The Dodge Girl"). She is in the prime of her beauty at this time and she reveals a smoking body in her many dances.

3. Ruta Lee is also quite attractive to look at. Still, a movie career that went from "Witness for the Prosecution" to "Hootenanny Hoot" is not going well. Lots of TV game shows were to be in Ms. Lee's future.

4. Appearances by Vickie (baby got back) Dougan and an uncredited Maureen Reagan (daughter of Pres. Ronald Reagan). Ms. Dougan was a pretty gal who made a name for herself by wearing dresses in the fifties that revealed anal cleavage. Ms. Reagan shows up for a brief moment to call Joby Baker "a square".

Um, that's about it.

The folk music is innocuous for the most part. Although by the end of the movie, I found myself really disliking Sheb Wooley, who gets to do three songs, including the title theme. Would have been nice to see Johnny Cash showcased more. The Gateway Trio made me nauseous jumping on a trampoline in the chorus of one of their amusing (?) songs. For token's sake, they throw in two black guys, Joe and Eddie (no, not Flo and Eddie) doing a rousing hand-clapping version of "There's A Meeting Here Tonight". Hopefully, it's not a KKK meeting.

Pretty silly film in the end. I can only recommend it for a look at a young Johnny Cash, the marvelous legs of Ms. Austin and Ms. Ruta Lee showing some attractive décolletage and gams.

Hootenanny Hoot (1963)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Slight but entertaining musical from MGM has a television director (Peter Breck) and a producer (Ruta Lee) whose marriage is breaking apart. He leaves town a soon finds himself in a small town in Missouri where he's introduced to a local "hootenanny". After seeing some of the musical acts he tries to get it produced and on television but guess who he'll after meet again? The actual "story" here isn't much as its poorly written and probably done so on purpose. There's no doubt that the main goal of this film was to show off some of the musical performers and as long as you like the music you should have an okay time going through the film. The film follows the same structure as stuff like ROCK AROUND THE CLOCK and TWIST AROUND THE CLOCK and that's to introduce new music to a wider range of people for acceptance. The music here just happens to be country and folk, which the film tries to say is one in the same. I'm sure many people would debate that but either way we get some very good numbers here with the highlight being an appearance by Johnny Cash doing Frankie's Man Johnny. Other numbers include Joe and Eddy's There's a Meeting Here Tonight, The Brothers Four doing Frogg and Little Cory and a strong Abilene by George Hamilton IV. There are a lot of banjos and old-fashion dances going around but I guess that's what a hootenanny is all about. If you hate country music and folk then there's really do reason to check this out as the story isn't strong enough to carry the thing. If you can put up with the music it's worth checking out, although I'm sure many will be hitting the fast-forward button to get to the music.